2020 South Korean legislative election (April 15th)

[H. Ross Peron]

Liberals have mainly been trying to shift blame to the Shincheonji Christian cult, that violated the quarentine and was almost single handedly responsibile for massively inflating the outbreak. The Cult is very close to the Conservatives (conservatives love these weird christian cults, which have a ton of followers in SK). Evangelical Christians have always been very conservative in SK, while Catholic/Buddhist anti-evangelical resentment feeds into them leaning liberal.

This isn't wholly accurate. Shincheonji is generally regarded as a heretical cult by *other Christian denominations* (my church's pastor has warned of them on various occasions). Moreover, while there is a strong Christian Right in South Korea fed by anti-communism and increasingly fears of a sexual revolution, Protestants don't vote anymore right-wing than their Catholic and Buddhist counterparts. While Syngman Rhee was a Methodist, none of the subsequent military dictator Presidents (Park Chung Hee, Chun Doo Hwan, and Roh Tae Woo) were Protestants. If you look at religious statistics, Protestantism is most prevalent in the Seoul region and the Jeolla province which is precisely where liberals are the strongest. Conversely, Buddhists are much stronger in the Gyeongsang provinces which has been a conservative stronghold for a generation.

[H. Ross Peron]

May post more detailed analysis later, but this election is in many ways a reversion to the mean (albeit in a Minjoo favoured way) and shows the enduring strength of regionalism in Korean politics. With 95% of the votes in, we see the same east-west divide that was seen in the 1967, 1971, and 1997 Presidential elections.

The key to Minjoo's decisive victory was in the national capital region which consists of the cities of Seoul and Incheon as well as Gyeonggi province. It is by far the most populous region of the country, with about half of the nation's population and National Assembly seats. Minjoo won the vast majority of the seats here, with the conservatives only being victorious in the wealthy areas of Seoul (such as Gangnam) and Seongnam, as well as some outlying, more rural areas.

Minjoo had a similar strong showing in the other swing region of Chungcheong Province. They made a clean sweep in the urban areas of Daejeon and Sejong while having a narrow lead in the more rural Land constituencies as well. Jeolla returned to its Minjoo roots after having embraced the People's Party 4 years ago, with the Democrats winning all but one of the seats in Gwangju as well as North and South Jeolla.

The Busan/South Gyeongsang region has attracted strong interest in recent years due to the belief that President Moon and former President Rohs' origins there would turn this formerly conservative stronghold to a swing region. This was reinforced by the emergence of the "Naktong River Belt" where the Minjoo Party showed strength in many of the industrial towns and cities along that river in S. Gyeongsang due to many of its residents being migrants from other provinces. In that context, today's results are rather disappointing. In Busan, Minjoo appears to have actually lost seats compared to 2016 while in S. Gyeongsang they failed to make any gains. The only gain for Minjoo came in the city of Ulsan, where it won one seat.

The North Gyeongsang and Daegu areas have been the heart of South Korean conservatism, being the home region of former President Park Chung Hee and his daughter Park Geun Hye. The United Future Party won all but one seat in the region (and that seat is because former conservative Presidential candidate Hong Jun-Pyo is running as an independent), with Minjoo losing the single Daegu seat it won in the last election.

Minjoo won every seat on the island province of Jeju which has been something of a swing region.

Lastly, the conservatives won in Gangwon province but Minjoo won the urban seats there.

Overall I'm satisfied with Minjoo's decisive win over the conservatives. However, I am disappointed by the revival of regionalism after its seeming weakening in the 2016 legislative, 2017 presidential, and 2018 regional elections. Moon won Busan and narrowly lost S. Gyeongsang in his presidential victory, suggesting that this region might become more open to electing members of the opposition. However, the current results belie those hopes. Furthermore, the social democratic Justice Party only won one geographical constituency where the party standard bearer Sim Sang-Jung was running. The suicide of Noh Hwae-Chan, amogn other problems, has severely weakened the party.

[H. Ross Peron]

Can someone tell me of the non-Minjoo Left? What, other then the suicide of Mr. Roe, is the reason for the problems in the Justice party from being overpassed by the Open Democrats? Why haven’t the Labor party or Minjung managed to gain much relevance, and what were they doing before about it?

The Open Democrats are basically a satellite party of Minjoo. The Minjung Party is basically a crypto pro-North Korean, left-wing nationalist party making its agenda unpalatable to most voters. About a decade ago, the soft left and social democratic types currently in the Justice Party were allied with the left-wing nationalist current in the United Progressive Party...but the party ended up splitting and then banned because one legislator was found to have advocated sabotage in the case of a US-North Korean war.